> Apps that offer what should have been offered by the OS vendor in the first place.
This is really it. The Google/Android team have already made the "Zebra" library that actually reads barcodes; why on earth do they not include this as a standard app. Instead we get this myriad of different barcode scanner apps with all sorts of harmful features. All the heavy lifting is done by the Android team anyway (the actual barcode scanning).
To make matters worse, scanning a barcode when you enter a store/cafe (to register your location), is now begin done everywhere in order to track potential covid19 spreaders. This forces anyone without an iPhone to install at least one of these potentially harmful apps.
Yeah, it's always in the flashlights, the barcode scanners, the background packs. They all address super basic functionality that many, many people seem to want (if I could just set a ringtone from YouTube, it'd save me from going through a bunch of shady apps, if I ever needed a ringtone that is). Yet they just aren't included in the base OS (or weren't always, my lineage OS has a flashlight currently). Therefore, they offer very low hanging fruit(super simple app, one can hardly ask money for it, so how does one make money?)
I heard from a friend that iOS has TOTP and indeed a barcode scanner build in, same goes for cal/carddav. To be fair, my wife's Pocophone also comes up with a QR-code icon when the cam detects a QR code. And, FireFox for mobile has a QC code scanner build in (although since I now have to open a new tab for each new page and I end up with many many tabs of the same 4 websites I find myself using FF less and less).
Maybe the experience on Pixel Phones is better? GCam makes a lot of difference in many aspects.
Both a QR-capable camera and a flashlight in the notification bar are in all my Android phones, and they've been for a very long time. I know the Nexus One didn't include it, but those will have problems with modern TLS anyway.
The problem is likely elsewhere. It wouldn't surprise me if many of these users are tricked into installing these apps. It is quite popular for malware to disguise itself as a legitimate app as to not raise suspicion.
Discoverability is just as much an issue as feature including. If you have to go into a special QR mode (which a lot of cameras did), you’re never going to use the feature, and it’s hard to break those mental models if the feature gets silently added in later iterations; you’re always going to remember that first encounter where something didn’t work seamlessly.
Indeed it is. It wasn't at all obvious on my phone that I could put a flashlight toggle on my notification bar, so for a long time I still kept the old Motorola DroidLight app, which, despite being unmaintained for a very long time, worked beautifully.
I have a pixel but i don't have qr scanning built in to the camera. It was at one point built into the "google vision" thing, but i haven't seen it in the ui for a while.
In a very google move, Google goggles was rebranded as Google lens and the Google goggles app stopped doing anything. As far as I know Google lens still does everything goggles did, including bar code/qr codes.
Its provided by Google Lens suggestions, so you'll need to have that enabled in the Camera settings for it to appear. It also seems a little slow sometimes, give it a few seconds for it to show up a small suggestion bubble at the bottom of the viewfinder.
I'm using Google Camera version 8.1 on a fully updated Pixel 4a and it works for me.
> (if I could just set a ringtone from YouTube, it'd save me from going through a bunch of shady apps, if I ever needed a ringtone that is)
I don't like that example of utilitarian because it fights the youtube platform which does not want you downloading videos. Anything that sidesteps some sort of security fence or functionality is shady to begin with; even if you think it's fair use. Plus there's the whole copyright minefield.
> Yeah, it's always in the flashlights, the barcode scanners, the background packs.
Why are Google afraid to release a free non-harmful version of those popular apps. Is it to keep the illusion the app-store is a vibrant market place where tons of developers get rich? It just seems nuts to allow all those harmful apps (that does virtually nothing) to float among the top downloads.
FWIW I've not had an Android phone lacking a flashlight in the OS since... ever, I think. At a guess, the apps are preying on customers not aware of the OS-level functionality.
QR scanning seems a little more complicated. FF for Android integrates a QR scanner, but chrome does not. Google's default camera also opens links, if you allow Google Lens.
I have a Nexus 5, and I can confirm the flashlight is available in the system tray icon. This is true for all Google phones since at least Nexus 4. It is my understanding that AOSP as well as Google's Android implementation has always exposed access to the flashlight hardware (although somebody mentioned this not being the case with Nexus One).
Since it's not an app, but hidden under edit in the pull down notification tray, people may still end up looking for a flaslight app. Perhaps a warning in the Play store that "You already have a flashlight, it's here..." would be a good comprimise? Although that might be considered "MS pushing IE", because the Flashy flashlight app has features(tm) (omg blink S.O.S., gotta have that :s).
> Why are Google afraid to release a free non-harmful version of those popular apps.
They already did; these have both been built-in for years. The flashlight was added in Android 5.0 (https://www.androidauthority.com/android-5-0-lollipop-offici... I'm having a harder time figuring out when the barcode scanner was added, but my phone does it automatically in the camera app now.
(Disclosure: I work for Google, speaking only for myself)
If Android has a built-in QR scanner now, that must be something that came with Android 11, but
September 8 2020 cannot qualify as "for years". It takes a while for OEM's to catch up as well.
There are certainly Android phones that ships with this feature (QR-scanner), but stock Android 10 does not. (Google lens != Standard Photo app).
If you know about it, you can start "Google lens" app, but that app does not even come up as a suggestion when you type QR scanner into the play store. I.e. even when you have a QR scanner available on your phone, you wouldn't know unless you somehow knew about "Google lens".
I even have a pixel3 and forgot Lens existed; the first time I was exposed to it by the phone it looked like yet another Google scans all your stuff and gives you questionable suggestions feature. It never occurred to me it would do something as straightforward as decode QRs.
I have a Pixel 3a, and I'm pretty sure it's done this since it was new (Spring 2019). I also thought my previous phone (Pixel 1) did it, though I don't have anymore and can't check.
There are many phones that have it (and have had it for a while like the Pixel it seems). Some can also enable Google lens from within the camera app, I cannot though on stock Android version 10.
> Why are Google afraid to release a free non-harmful version of those popular apps.
Fear of anti-competition lawsuits and complaints. They're seeing what happens when Apple integrates stuff into iOS / OS X core that previously were third party provided, or the flak that Amazon gets for pushing AmazonBasics products.
> Fear of anti-competition lawsuits and complaints.
They could just create an open source variant that suddenly shows up top when people search for QR or barcode scanner. It would be in their best interest, and it would not violate any anti-competition laws, nobody can demand to see how these apps are ranked I guess?
> How are they going to do this without generating more criticism?
From the people who make those crummy apps; criticism surely cannot hurt Google all that much?
> But then you’d have to get an OS update to heaps of phones.
That's not a viable option, this requires tons of work from OEM's that Google would have to pay for. I've rarely ever gotten any OS updates at all on Android - apart from my latest phone. But I think the only reason I get OS updates now is due to the fact that Nokia just ships stock Android under the "android_one" brand.
The ability to read QR codes should be added to Android's Compatibility Test Suite (CTS) default camera app, this way vendors would need to ensure their camera app are all equipped with this if they want to ship with Google Play Store.
There probably could be some backlash, but it would be easy for Google to brush this off by listing harmful features they removed in the process.
They have done more drastic things in the past. They have even removed apps entirely from Android phones due to very harmful features, and nobody cared when they heard about the horrid things these apps did in the background.
the platform should accept the criticism, because it doesn't hurt them. they have no feelings.
People doing low effort apps can only just whinge when the floor shifts under them. i have no sympathy - they just need to adapt and improve, and create new value to sell.
> To make matters worse, scanning a barcode when you enter a store/cafe (to register your location), is now begin done everywhere in order to track potential covid19 spreaders. This forces anyone without an iPhone to install at least one of these potentially harmful apps.
Our (New Zealand) Covid tracing app scans QR codes itself. What jurisdictions are requiring to scan an arbitrary QR code using random apps?
I recall back in the early days (before NZ Covid Tracer was released) we had the same system where every shop had a QR code that linked to its own guestbook type website.
"Better" is certainly a point of view here. Having to tell the government all of your whereabouts when you already live on an Island with no spreading is an overreach, IMO.
The New Zealand government doesn't learn "all your whereabouts" by default. The app is storing locally what it has learned about places you visited by scanning QR codes, and comparing that to information it is being sent over the Network (by the government) to discern if you went anywhere that the government says warrants special action - if so you get notified.
For most Kiwis this means a bunch of QR code data is stored on their phone and, months or years from now when the emergency is over (depending on how incompetent other countries are) that data is deleted. There is no NZ department of health MySQL database full of geo data of every New Zealand citizen and never will be.
If you're a case (remembering that New Zealand has elimination, so rather than cases being millions of people as in the US for example, they're very rare) then you can choose to help the contact tracers by giving them your data and in that case they do get all the data because you gave it to them. Because New Zealand has elimination contact tracing is something done by a handful of experts.
I would guess that like most countries New Zealand's contact tracing experts worked previously with sexually transmitted infections - so they already understand the sensitivity of this work. COVID-19 is actually less awkward, because at least you don't have to admit to fucking somebody you claim you're not sexually attracted to, just that you were in the same room as them for a period of time.
But of course none of what I wrote above matters much because those are merely facts, and for so many Americans mere facts can't oppose a Truth they have become certain of despite all evidence to the contrary. Not that Mother Nature gives a damn whether you believe her.
Believe it or not but not everybody believes that human rights like privacy are always optional when lives are at stake. Ever heard of the phrase "the end doesn't justify the means"?
exactly, how are you going to visit the mistress(es) if government tracks everything and eventually will be leaked? (a bit of sarcasm but the point stands, privacy shouldn't be optional)
Well, when the users already give the government access to their location 24/7 with that app, at least they include a barcode/QR scanner.
But privacy is clearly one of the victims of this pandemic. At least some countries are now opening up the source-code of the front and back-end of their apps. They had to do that here in Norway (they had to replace the whole app actually) when the original closed source version was demonstrated to contain harmful features...
We have a similar system is AU. It’s not really enforced all that well. But most people cooperate and life is generally back to normal. You also only need to do it in enclosed areas like shops. Mask wearing is still mandatory on public transport.
Unfortunately very low cases doesn’t mean the virus is gone. Occasionally there is a case and if you want to clamp that down as fast as possible, you need contact tracing. Which means we need to know where you are.
For most people, no extra information is being leaked. Facebook and google already know where they are and they are far more malicious than the AU or NZ government. The tin foil hatters like you can take extra measures I’m sure.
The US has over 25million cases and over 400k dead. That’s literally the entire population of Australia infected. So I’d argue that NZ and AU are objectively better and we shouldn’t worry about “overreach” just yet.
OnePlus seems to have the QR code scanner built into its standard camera app. And the flashlight into the setting shortcuts. Very convenient, and perhaps necessary, considering all these app stores becoming malware vectors.
My Moto G8 Power (G Power in the US) Android phone has it as part of the Camera app; when you point the camera at a code, a small bubble will pop up at the bottom allowing you to follow the link/see the content.
The issue is not having a default app or not, the issue is having a qr reader external service.
Imagine you are an app developer of a really simple app that takes a number and tells you if that number is in a valid phone format or not. You have a textbox, the user enters it, you do the checking and display the result. Easy. Now imagine you want to allow scanning a qr which contains a number, to do the checking afterwards. You need to either ask your users to use an external app to scan and then open yours, include all the qr related library inside yours, or use a special intent from a third party app (that the users need to have already installed).
First solution is slow and inconvenience for users, the second is what almost all apps do, but then the code logic is duplicated on all of them (with the increment in app size). The third option is the best, both for the developer and for the user, however there is no official qr service so in the end this is basically option 1.
I mean, you already have a service to get a picture, a file and a contact, among others (you don't need to include all the code, simply do a call to the respective intent and wait for the result) so why don't extend this with the qr too?
The same is true of things like Instagram, where they have made downloading an image so difficult that people install malware purporting to be able to do it all the time. Pretty huge vector.
While Google Lens does the job for the most part, we created a free privacy minded security first app - https://dhiway.com/seqr/ This app plugs in to Google's anti-malware lookup service to flag harmful content from making it to the device.
My Android 10 phone from Samsung has both the flashlight and the QR code scanner icons in the drop down notification bar. I don't know if it is a standard Android feature or something from Samsung.
My S21 Ultra has a QR scanner built in, but no barcode. Are the old ones still used for such purposes? I've only seen QR codes used for eg contact tracing.
There should probably be a "standard apps" project, similar to prog-langs "standard library" - sponsored by goog et al but not owned by it, and heavy on security and standardisation.
what do you recon would be included?
- barcode scanner,
- auth app,
- calculator of some kind,
- wifi management, dns/network/firewall management.
Actually they do if they have Google Assistant, which I imagine anyone with Android 7 or later will. If you use the Google Lens feature it will decode barcodes and QR codes. But unfortunately this feature is pretty much self-discovery rather than a publicised function
I don't know if it differs from various vendor releases of android but certainly on my Samsung S20, QR codes can be read without an additional app just by pointing the camera app at one. I seem to recall my Pixel XL did the same.
There is no "the camera app"; the manufacturer often provides their own. It may well be in recent versions of GCam, but quite often it requires you to bail out to Google Lens for some reason.
Android is like Forrest Gump's box of chocolates: you never quite know what you're going to get. And sometimes it's stale.
My Samsung has a built-in QR scanner, which I found out by accident.
I downloaded an app for it because it never crossed my mind it would be built into the camera app. After all I don't want to take pictures of the QR code, I want to decode it...
No idea when it was introduced. I've had an S3, S5 and now an S8 where I discovered it by accident last year. Pretty sure the S3 didn't have it.
The stock Camera app on my Android phone recognises QR codes. This is on Android 11 on a Pixel 3. I think this has been the case for a few versions of the OS (but don't have access to old versions to check).
This is really it. The Google/Android team have already made the "Zebra" library that actually reads barcodes; why on earth do they not include this as a standard app. Instead we get this myriad of different barcode scanner apps with all sorts of harmful features. All the heavy lifting is done by the Android team anyway (the actual barcode scanning).
To make matters worse, scanning a barcode when you enter a store/cafe (to register your location), is now begin done everywhere in order to track potential covid19 spreaders. This forces anyone without an iPhone to install at least one of these potentially harmful apps.